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[spyzowin]

We have a general policy that suggests that no online behavior is technically disruptive as it can be ignored. Nor do we impose any sort of speech code on online discourse. But we might be a bit of an extreme.

What sort of competing policies are there out there?

[melba_frilkins]

That's a really interesting way to think about that, the notion that online behavior cannot be disruptive. But I would respectfully disagree. Yes, online posts or emails can be ignored but not until after one has read/viewed inappropriate content to decide whether to ignore it. How is that supposed to work?

I once had a student post blatantly obscene & only marginally relevant comments in a discussion forum (I will not repeat it here, but it was, let's just say, a very colorful description of certain sexual practices). I deleted his post and sent him a note. He turned out to be apologetic and was fine for the rest of the semester and continued with a high level of appropriate participation.

But if he had insisted on continuing such posts, I would not have hesitated to block him from the class and then send the case along to student affairs. It's not a freedom of speech issue. Just like in a live classroom, some forms of expression are appropriate, others are not. Indeed, in the online environment, it's easier to let student discussion wander off track because there is no class "time" to waste, but there still have to be basic limits in place. It's not the job of other students to memorize which student is the one who sometimes posts offensive things and then be sure never open a post from that student. And as the instructor, I have no right to ignore offensive content--I have to moderate every discussion and grade every submission.

At my institution, the same rules for dropping out a student or barring access apply to the classroom and online environments. If an instructor entirely drops a student from an online class, that student can no longer log in at all. But instructors also have the option to temporarily block student access from the course content--they can still get in and check grades, email the instructor, etc., but not actively participate.

Dropping or blocking an online student is most often done for lack of attendance and rarely in response to disruptive behavior. I believe we recently had a case where a student was blocked because he was using the in-class email to repeatedly send inappropriate messages to other students. I don't know the details of the case.

[biomancer]

I've never taught an online-only course, though my courses do include online content (quizzes, posted notes, etc.) 

I'm wondering, Amnirov, what you would/could do if you had a student (or multiple students) engaging in an unwarranted flamewar on a course discussion board, or posting offensive things, or picking on a specific student repeatedly?  If it's bad enough to compromise the learning environment for another student, then it seems to me that something should be done to restore the learning environment.

[spyzowin]

That's a really interesting way to think about that, the notion that online behavior cannot be disruptive. But I would respectfully disagree. Yes, online posts or emails can be ignored but not until after one has read/viewed inappropriate content to decide whether to ignore it. How is that supposed to work?

I once had a student post blatantly obscene & only marginally relevant comments in a discussion forum (I will not repeat it here, but it was, let's just say, a very colorful description of certain sexual practices). I deleted his post and sent him a note. He turned out to be apologetic and was fine for the rest of the semester and continued with a high level of appropriate participation.

But if he had insisted on continuing such posts, I would not have hesitated to block him from the class and then send the case along to student affairs. It's not a freedom of speech issue. Just like in a live classroom, some forms of expression are appropriate, others are not. Indeed, in the online environment, it's easier to let student discussion wander off track because there is no class "time" to waste, but there still have to be basic limits in place. It's not the job of other students to memorize which student is the one who sometimes posts offensive things and then be sure never open a post from that student. And as the instructor, I have no right to ignore offensive content--I have to moderate every discussion and grade every submission.

At my institution, the same rules for dropping out a student or barring access apply to the classroom and online environments. If an instructor entirely drops a student from an online class, that student can no longer log in at all. But instructors also have the option to temporarily block student access from the course content--they can still get in and check grades, email the instructor, etc., but not actively participate.

Dropping or blocking an online student is most often done for lack of attendance and rarely in response to disruptive behavior. I believe we recently had a case where a student was blocked because he was using the in-class email to repeatedly send inappropriate messages to other students. I don't know the details of the case.

Well, we can warn students that their comments are inappropriate, but our legal counsel takes a dim view of deleting comments or blocking students. I've been teaching at least one online course per term now since 2006 and I haven't seen anything all that shocking.

About three years ago, I did have two students did get into it a little. Very tame stuff by greater internet standards. One student complained that hu felt insulted by the other student. I posted our netiquette guidelines, told both of them to play nicely, and made it clear to the insulted student that sometimes feelings get hurt and that's just a part of life. They both toned it down.

[melba_frilkins]

Yes, the truly shocking is rare. I had only that one isolated case across thousands of student posts in eight years of teaching online.

But I think your legal counsel might think again about their advice if they knew the full range of what happens in the online environment and how it does parallel the traditional classroom.

For example, a common classroom activity is to assign students to groups and group members read and critique drafts of each others' papers. If one student turns in an assignment is off-topic, obscene, pornographic, and in no way captures the intent of the assignment, would it be obligatory for the instructor to distribute copies of that paper to the other students and require them to read and critique it? I would think not.



So what would be the legal difference for the instructor to screen out entirely inappropriate posts when students are sharing and discussing their work online? Such cases are extremely rare, thankfully. But in these cases,  I'd be more concerned with potential grievances from students who are repeatedly and seriously offended or harassed than with complaints from a student who needs to learn how to communicate appropriately in an online classroom.


Shoot, I was considering this semester to "reject" (not "delete") any student posts that fail to meet minimal standards in the mechanics of writing. Plenty of instructors will kick back or give a zero grade to papers turned in with excessive writing errors, why not with with online submissions?
 
A distinction may be whether one is looking at the online activity as simply a discussion versus a graded class assignment with clear standards and expectations.

[spyzowin]

Yes, the truly shocking is rare. I had only that one isolated case across thousands of student posts in eight years of teaching online.

But I think your legal counsel might think again about their advice if they knew the full range of what happens in the online environment and how it does parallel the traditional classroom.

For example, a common classroom activity is to assign students to groups and group members read and critique drafts of each others' papers. If one student turns in an assignment is off-topic, obscene, pornographic, and in no way captures the intent of the assignment, would it be obligatory for the instructor to distribute copies of that paper to the other students and require them to read and critique it? I would think not.



So what would be the legal difference for the instructor to screen out entirely inappropriate posts when students are sharing and discussing their work online? Such cases are extremely rare, thankfully. But in these cases,  I'd be more concerned with potential grievances from students who are repeatedly and seriously offended or harassed than with complaints from a student who needs to learn how to communicate appropriately in an online classroom.


Shoot, I was considering this semester to "reject" (not "delete") any student posts that fail to meet minimal standards in the mechanics of writing. Plenty of instructors will kick back or give a zero grade to papers turned in with excessive writing errors, why not with with online submissions?
 
A distinction may be whether one is looking at the online activity as simply a discussion versus a graded class assignment with clear standards and expectations.

Of course you could have all discussion forums "pre-moderated". There is a box on BB8 to check and you can do this. As long as you tell them that all comments are pre-moderated according to some well-published rubric prior to posting, there is no problem. It's when students are randomly censored that problems arise. But it just never really seems to happen.

I was hoping (though perhaps that's the wrong word) that someone would have an actual horror story. But it appears that no one does.